Ireland’s football team was cruelly denied a place at next year’s World Cup in South Africa due to a blatant piece of cheating from the French this morning, declares Neil Walker.
France 
Why Jacques Chirac is facing corruption charges
Former French president Jacques Chirac will be trialled for misappropriating public funds during his nearly twenty years as mayor of Paris. Will the French justice system hold Chirac and other dodgy high profile pollies to account? No guillotine necessary.
Sarkozy’s £250,000 shower
French President Nicolas Sarkozy has made British MPs’ expenses look like chump change, with a new report finding he spent £160m (AU$290m) during his six-month stint in charge of the European Union, including £250,000 on a new shower that he never actually used.
Downing Street plots to buy Blair’s way into the EU Presidency
British PM Gordon Brown is planning to buy off Angela Merkel and Nikolas Sarkozy’s votes for the European Union Presidency by offering them big jobs within the Union should Tony Blair get up.
Asterix turns 50
French comic star Asterix has been battling the Roman Empire for 50 years now, and despite hitting middle age, the pint-sized Gaulish warrior, his friend Obelix and dog Dogmatix are about to embark on their 43th adventure.
How Italy’s Taliban bribery got French soldiers killed
When French soldiers arrived in the Afghan region of Sarobi last year, they believed the area to be peaceful. Ten dead and mutilated soldiers later, it’s clear they were wrong. And it was Italy who misled them.
French Vogue does blackface
What, is everybody doing it now? The latest edition of French Vogue magazine features supermodel Lara Stone in blackface. Stay tuned for next month’s spread, featuring a man in a duck suit and a guest appearance by Farnsy.
Renowned nuclear physicist was an Al Qaeda mole
Adlène Hicheur, a French physicist working on the Hadron Collider, has been arrested on terrorism charges after admitting to working as a “mole” for Al Qaeda. Cue calls of “He seemed like such a nice boy…”
revealed The Middle East’s secret plan to bring down the dollar
Arab states, along with China, Japan, Russia and France, have been holding secret meetings to plot a move from doing oil deals in US dollars, instead moving to a mix of the yen, yuan, euro, gold and a new, unified Arab currency.
McDonald’s in the Louvre? Sacré bleu!
McDonald’s is setting up shop at the Louvre, and the French are not lovin’ it. But the gallery claims erecting the Golden Arches outside the home of fine art “is in line with the museum’s image”.
ANL’s French owner can’t pay its $5.7b debt
The French shipping company that owns and operates Australian National Line, is involved in talks to reschedule an estimated $A5.7 billion of debt on which it is unable to make payments, as banks clamp down hard.
Why do France Telecom employees keep killing themselves?
24 employees of France’s largest telephone operator, France Telecom, have committed suicide in less than two years. Is the company to blame, or is it all just a freak coincidence?
Touched up: France demands labelling for airbrushed images
Valerie Boyer, an MP in Sarzoky’s UMP, is one of the politicians pushing in France for obligatory notices wherever photographs have been airbrushed. Our suggestion: “Models may be fatter than they appear”.
The French Model: famous for finances, not fashion
For once, the French economic model isn’t being ridiculed, with France proving resilient amongst the GFC doom and gloom. But will they face a new debt crisis?
The grim reality that is France, happiness indexes notwithstanding
The French way of life can be as brutal and nasty as any other around the world and no amount of papering over with nice talk can avoid the facts.
Sacré bleu! Climate change threatens French wine
Fifty of France’s leading chefs, sommeliers and chateaux have written an open letter to president Nicolas Sarkozy with a blunt message: climate change will kill the French wine industry. To make matters worse, rising temperatures could mean the best wines soon come from England — or even Scotland!
Sarkozy takes a tumble
Despite being so well-known as a super-fit running fanatic he is mocked as “Nike-olas”, 54-year-old French President Nicolas Sarkozy has been taken to hospital after collapsing during a midday run.
Tour de France: Evans falters as Contador steams ahead
For Australia’s cycling cheer squad, the extent of Cadel Evans’ demise has come as a genuine shock. So how did Australia’s golden boy from a genuine yellow jersey chance to 12th place?
Sarkozy really likes flowers
French president Nicolas Sarkozy spends £660 a day on flowers, according to the presidential accounts. That’s more than Elton John, says The Guardian wanting to underline the excess.
French teens burn cars in Bastille Day tradition
Disenfranchised youth torch cars and riot in the streets on Bastille Day, with some of the same issues that caused the 18th century uprising confronting France today.
Paris: the city of sadness
The Eiffel Tower isn’t enough. Smile ambassadors have been hired to promote Paris and prove it’s not full of snooty Frenchmen, in light of dropping tourist numbers.
Sarkozy’s proposed burqua ban is a blunt instrument
There is no single experience of face-covering, just as there is no single experience of the bikini, writes Shakira Hussein.
Why Sarkozy wants to ban the burqa
French President Nicolas Sarkozy has made waves with his calls to ban the burqa from being worn in public. His sentiments are caught up in a collision of French feminism, nationalism and secularism.
Is the burqa a prison?
French President Nicolas Sarkozy has declared the Islamic burqua a sign of the “subjugation” and “submission of women”. But what if a woman chooses to wear it of her own accord? asks Salon’s Broadsheet.
Sarkozy’s grand cultural revolution
In recent weeks French MPs have a new game to play with their maverick, megalomanic leader: spot the cultural reference, writes Jason Burke.
